WASHINGTON,
D.C. – U.S. Senator Kit Bond today went to
the Senate floor to blast the bonuses being paid to AIG after the taxpayers had
to bail out the bank again. Bond also criticized the Obama Administration for
not blocking this misuse of taxpayer money when it approved the release of
additional $30 Billion for AIG earlier this month and for continuing to fail to
address the root of our economic crisis.

“The
failed senior executives and the board of directors should have been fired when
the government first had to step in and rescue the company,” said Bond. “If any
worker in Missouri or in any state across the nation drove their company into
the ground – they would be fired. They wouldn’t receive a bonus. This double
standard for Wall Street versus Main Street is another reason why Americans are
so mad about how their tax dollars are being used.”

After
blasting the bonuses paid to AIG, Bond also took President Obama and his
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to task for failing to prevent this payout.
AIG’s intention to pay these bonuses has been no secret, and the Administration
was completely aware of the payments. When the Administration gave AIG an
additional $30 billion in taxpayer funds earlier this month, Treasury Secretary
Geithner could have ensured taxpayer dollars wouldn’t be used to pay the some
$170 million in bonuses. Bond called this latest misstep by Secretary Geithner
just another example of his failed leadership.

While
an outrageous and unacceptable use of taxpayer dollars, Bond stressed that just
focusing on the bonuses misses the broader point. A greater outrage is the
Administration’s ad-hoc and knee-jerk reaction to each crisis. Bond criticized
the Administration’s “ad-hocracy,” which has resulted in throwing billions in
good taxpayer dollars in to failing banks. Instead of this failed approach, the
Administration needs to be focused on fixing the root of the problem – the toxic
assets clogging our credit system.

Bond
urged the Administration to abandon their failed, ad-hoc approach and instead
adopt a bold plan to address the credit crisis, a plan that has a clear exit
strategy like in his American Credit Cleanup Plan. Bond’s tried and
tested plan includes three key steps to fix our credit
crisis:

1)
Identify failing institutions;

2)
Remove the toxic assets, protect the depositors, and remove the failed
leadership; and